Jolly sailor bold
by mentosmorii
Summary: "'My pirate prince,' Angeline said." A selkie au exploring the relationship between Artemis Sr. and Angeline — the quote above comes from the sixth book in the series.


On the night that they first met, she'd called him her pirate king.

* * *

The year was 1985.

The Anglo-Irish Agreement had just been signed. The River Thames was dead. In the east, the Berlin wall stood strong (it would soon fall); in the west, the Northern Ireland peace walls towered high (they would not). Cold war, civil war, world war — wherever you turned, violence was desperate to weave itself back into global politics.

Untouched, The Ivy sat in the center of West Street.

Old money had their own problems to worry about.

Artemis Fowl I was young and invincible in a sea of men guided more by money than they were by convictions. Tonight wasn't his fête, but it might as well have been — it was impossible to even tell who the original host was when the guests fawned over him, hanging on to his every word. He was the golden boy of the night, and his last name loomed larger than life.

How could it not? When the world seemed on the precipice of a terrible, unknown future, a name that spanned centuries, that spanned a history of every unthinkable era in humanity's past, was a life-preserver. The name Fowl was well-worn and bloody — yet it persisted.

It survived, and that was enough.

Artemis Fowl I was young.

* * *

The night was ebbing into the dawn, and Artemis had grown bored of the chattering sycophants that had encircled him as the party grew livelier.

He was drunk, but he wasn't drunk enough to believe that the socialites at this party truly believed his every joke to be funny to the point of uproarious laughter.

Stepping into the cool air of the night, he breathed in the soft, salty air.

He frowned, shuddering despite himself.

"Too much to drink?"

Artemis started, jolted from his thoughts as though clumsily waking up from a dream.

There was a woman leaning against the alleyway. She chuckled at his confusion, covering her mouth with a hand demurely.

"No," he said, a tad brusquely. The woman didn't even flinch, taking it in stride.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to pry," she smiled, her wide, brown eyes twinkling in the gloom of the street lights.

He found himself staring.

"I don't believe… we've met," he attempted, remembering his manners. She tilted her head, her smile deepening.

"You would be correct."

Shaking his head as if to sober up, he refocused his gaze on her. There was a slight chill in the air, but not nearly enough to warrant a full fur coat like the one draped about her. Stranger still was the jewelry she was wearing. Perched fetchingly around her neck was an unusual pearl necklace — even with his hazy vision, it was clear that each of the pearls was distinctly different from the others. Soft pinks, baby blues, and light grays adorned the asymmetric and lumpy beads. Those were fishermen's pearls, Artemis thought, admiring the way they caught the moonlight. When he was a boy, his father had cracked open a small series of oysters from down by the docks to show him the difference between the shape of the natural pearl and the polished counterpart on his mother's brooch. In the fading light, Artemis found he couldn't remember the point of that lesson.

He opened his mouth, at a loss for words. "I-" he began, furrowing his brow in thought. "What's your name?"

"_Angeline_," she responded, and the name sounded almost like a secret.

He swallowed.

"Oh," he said feebly. "I'm…Artemis."

"A hunter, then," Angeline raised her eyebrows.

"A _Fowl_," he stressed. She looked at him blankly.

"Pardon?"

Deflating a bit, he shoved his hands in his pockets. "I'm Artemis Fowl," he specified, trying to be nonchalant.

Seemingly understanding that she was missing something, Angeline laughed. "Good for you!"

Whether it was the alcohol or the night air, Artemis found himself laughing with her. Boldened, he reached for her hands, clasping them in his. "Tell me that you'll come dance with me," he requested.

She cocked her head. "Is tonight that sort of party?" she glanced through the windows of the restaurant, trying to spy inside.

He shook his head dismissively. "No. Dance with me anyway, though."

"Alright, Artemis," she said, offering him her arm. Delightedly, he took it, leading her inside the restaurant.

* * *

He ends up stealing her cloak off the coat rack when she wanders off to grab a drink.

Artemis doesn't quite know why he did it, but the fur of the garment is soft in his hands as he haphazardly shoves it at the Major, ordering him to hide it.

Perhaps she'll try to meet him again in order to find the cloak, he reasons back in his hotel that night.

The cloak remains in the trunk, collecting dust.

* * *

They married a year later.

It was a private affair, which is what you'd expect for a couple composed of an individual who, on paper, at least, didn't exist.

_Angeline_, he thinks that night as they lay in bed. Watching the moonlight dapple over her sleeping form, he gently moved a honey-colored curl away from her face. Angeline _Fowl_.

When he finally drifts off to sleep, he dreams of the sea.

* * *

For the first few years of their son's life, Angeline and Artemis Sr. trade off each night to tell their son bedtime stories. When he is older, Artemis Fowl II will recall his father's story of the fae fondly, giving it the high title of being his favorite story.

The tale of the leprechaun was his father's story, but his mother had her own favorite tale to tell.

* * *

Tucking her son into bed, Angeline reached to turn the light down low. Despite the fact her voice was soft as she spoke, he listened, wide awake.

"A human will take a merrow's cloak and keep them on the land for a few years," she whispered, tracing swirls over the duvet almost dreamily. "But the merrow always, always finds their cloak."

Her son blinked, his deep blue eyes wide. "What happens after that?"

"They go back to the sea."

"They aren't mad at the human?"

"No. If a merrow doesn't want to be caught, it is all too easy to plunge deep into the ocean and never reemerge," Angeline explained gently. "They let themselves get caught. After all, you sometimes must give up a little to get what you want. The merrow will stay on land for a brief while with the human, and when their time is up, they will return to the sea, taking the human with them."

Artemis looked stricken. "Humans are not able to live underwater, Mother!"

She brushed his hair aside fondly. "You are so smart, Arty. But I'm afraid there is still much you do not know. A human body cannot breathe under the sea, but human souls are hardy things, and that's what is important."

He furrowed his brow, clutching the covers of his bed. "That's what's important?"

She nodded. "Even so, before diving back into the sea, the merrow will make sure to wrap the soul up carefully in a spider-silk handkerchief. After that, they'll put on their cloak, put the handkerchief into their pocket, and swim back down into the depths. The sea is much nicer for the soul than land is, anyway," she tapped him on the nose, and Artemis wrinkled his nose.

"Are you saying that the soul just… stays in their pocket?"

"Oh, of course not," she looked at him in confusion. "Souls aren't meant to be kept in pockets — that'd be barbaric. They're kept in shipwrecks."

He sighed stubbornly, letting go of the covers. "I don't see how that's much better."

Angeline looked at him as though he'd said something quite silly, grinning indulgently. "It just is, my dear."

* * *

To lay with a merrow is to give your soul up to the sea.

Artemis Sr. would promise his wife that he was leaving on his final business trip before he set sail on the Fowl Star.

He almost made it to the Kandalaksha Gulf before the ocean swallowed him up.

* * *

The sea can be convinced to change its mind, however, and Artemis Sr. was spat back out amongst the dirty water of the wreck, flailing and choking on the fumes of the burning ship and the sickly sweet smell of the cola spilling out into the Russian gulf.

He would live.

The water knew that miles away, years away, his son would come to these shores to drag him back home.

Artemis Sr.'s time was not yet up.

* * *

When he awoke years later, he was in the Helinski hospital surrounded by a tearful Angeline and a guilty looking son. Moving slowly due to the haze of the pain medication, he moved to sit up. He nearly careened forward, and a nurse rushed to his side, steadying him.

Artemis Sr. peered quizzically down at the sheets, feeling unbalanced.

His _leg_.

He inhaled shakily, grasping at the sheets blindly. He was missing a _leg_.

Breathing heavy, he looked at his wife and son. Artemis refused to make eye contact. Shaking his head, he closed his gaping mouth.

"My son," he choked out, forcing himself to smile. "You've grown _so much_ — oh, _Arty_, come here."

Artemis all but flung himself at his father, embracing him. Artemis Sr. held onto him tightly, as though he was afraid he'd lose him.

"Father," his son breathed, and Artemis Sr. could feel wetness upon his shoulder. They stayed like that for a moment, and the hospital room fell silent.

Suddenly, he felt a hand come to rest on his other shoulder. Artemis Sr. looked up, finding himself eye-to-eye with his wife.

"Angie—?"

"My pirate king," she said softly, gently bringing his chin into her hands and running a thumb over the stubble of his cheek. "You've come back to me."


End file.
